


Please the Soul Well

by Lindenharp



Series: Two Travellers [4]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Masturbation, Slash, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-20
Updated: 2012-06-20
Packaged: 2017-11-08 04:46:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/439301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lindenharp/pseuds/Lindenharp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They've just saved the day (again!) and Jack is feeling restless and aroused.  Unfortunately, the Doctor can't touch him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Please the Soul Well

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Explicit sex. Brief, non-explicit mention of past torture.
> 
> Thanks to my betas: Canaana, Wendymr, and Elrhiarhodan.

_ There is something in staying close to men and women, and looking on them,  
and in the contact and odor of them, that pleases the soul well;  
All things please the soul—but these please the soul well. _

_ Walt Whitman, from “I Sing the Body Electric” _

  
  
Jack collapses on the sofa in the TARDIS library.  Today, it’s taken the form of a Victorian chaise upholstered in dark blue striped silk—the kind of sofa that used to be called a fainting couch.   _Appropriate_.  Now that he has time to think about what the Doctor did on the damaged Ghiloz ship, he might just faint.  “That was too close.  Too damn close.”  
  
“We had at least 4.2 seconds left before the generator went critical,” the Doctor says cheerfully.  “All’s well that ends well, as I once told Bill Shakespeare.”  He sprawls in a leather wingback chair, his feet propped on a matching ottoman.  
  
“You could have fried your brain using that Ghiloz telepathic interface.  What the hell were you thinking?”  
  
“I was thinking that the ship was going to blow up if I didn’t act quickly.  Don’t fuss.  I’m all right.  I  _am_ a telepath, you know.”  
  
Jack can’t help worrying.  The telepathic Ghiloz are not even vaguely humanoid, and it seems likely that a Ghiloz mind is wired differently to a Time Lord’s.  Then again, what does he know?  None of Jack’s psi ratings are above 37, and that’s low even for a human.  
  
“Never mind me, how are you?” the Doctor asks.  “You’re the one who had to run into a burning engine compartment to reach the emergency override.”  
  
“No problems,” Jack replies.  He holds up his hands, palms outwards, displaying the unblemished skin.  No need to mention that, half an hour ago, those hands were covered with second-degree burns and blood blisters.  All’s well, etc.  
  
“You look jumpy.”  
  
Jack shrugs.  “You know how it is after a close call.  Tired and wired.”  He smiles at the Doctor.  “You could help me unwind...”    
  
“I can’t do that.  Not just now.  Sorry.”  The Doctor sounds genuinely regretful.  
  
Jack leans forward and crooks a finger at the Doctor.  “C’mere.”  
  
To his astonishment, the Doctor scrambles out of his chair and backs away.  “No!  Don’t touch me!”  
  
Jack jerks his hand back reflexively.  He doesn’t know what’s going on, but that was real fear in the Doctor’s voice.  
  
“I’m sorry.”  The Doctor pulls the chair back until it’s two metres from the sofa, and sits down again.  “I didn’t think—I should have told you, but I hoped it would wear off before you—”  
  
“Doctor.”  Jack is proud of how calm he sounds, even though his heart is pounding and there’s a small, frozen asteroid in his throat.  “What is wrong with you?”  
  
“Nothing!  I told you—I’m fine.  Well, mostly fine.  That is, I will be.  In a few hours.  That interface was a bit non-standard, and it seems to have taken down my barriers.  That’s all.”  
  
“That’s _ all_?” Jack echoes.  A telepath’s barriers keep out other people’s thoughts and help preserve his own sense of self.  It’s a very good thing that the Doctor is only a touch telepath.  If Jack keeps his hands to himself, the Doctor is in no danger of being overwhelmed by his lover’s thoughts and memories.  Some of Jack’s memories of the  _Valiant_ would make Dante shudder.  
  
The Doctor gives him a reassuring smile.  “Don’t worry.  As long as you don’t make physical contact, you’ll be perfectly safe.”  
  
 _He’s worried that_ I’ll _ be safe?_  Jack looks at the Doctor.  Bringer of Darkness.  Destroyer of Worlds.  Survivor of the Time War.     _Oh.  Right._   Some of the Doctor’s memories would probably make the  Valiant  seem like a holiday camp.  He holds up his hands again, palms outward, but this time he keeps them very close to his chest.  “Got it.  No touching.”    
  
He gives the Doctor a no-hard-feelings smile.  “I’m going to hit the shower, if you don’t mind.”  A quick wank under steaming hot water will burn off his excess energy, sexual tension vanishing down the drain along with sweat and grime and the acrid odour of smoke.    
  
“Stay here.”  The Doctor’s voice is low, almost a whisper.  
  
“You want company?”  He can hold off on the shower for a while.  
  
“I want to watch.”  
  
Jack’s eyebrows shoot up.  When he was young and mortal and discovering the delights of sex, he fantasized about doing it with members of almost every other sapient species, but never with a Time Lord.  Time Lords were reputed to be vast, dispassionate intellects who observed the universe and held themselves apart from it.  You might as well fantasize about a mountain range or a nebula.  
  
Then Jack met the Doctor.  He quickly learned that this particular Time Lord was passionate about _ everything_, and watched the universe in much the same way that he flew the TARDIS: hands-on, full-speed, grinning like a loon, and applying a blunt object when necessary.  Eventually Jack discovered—to his infinite delight—that sex with the Doctor was very much like a ride in the TARDIS.  
  
They both prefer  _doing_ to watching, but since they can’t touch each other right now, Jack supposes this is the next best thing.  He’s never played with himself in front of the Doctor, though he doesn’t mind, of course.  Jack’s always been very comfortable in his body.  When he was still mortal, he spent two weeks as the star attraction at the Priapus Club on Tellemon Beta, performing three times a day for crowds of gawping tourists.  (It got a bit tedious after the first week, but it paid good money—enough to repair his ship and get off-world.)  Wanking for his lover’s enjoyment is no hardship at all.    
  
“It may not be much of a show,” he warns.  “I don’t think I have the energy or the patience for anything elaborate.”  
  
“I don’t want a show.  I don’t want flashy or acrobatic.  I just want to watch you come.”  The Doctor’s voice is raspy with desire.  “Pleasure yourself, Jack.”  
  
Jack starts to reach for his flies, and is interrupted by a snort.  “I never thought I’d have to tell  _you_ to get naked, Captain.”  
  
Grinning, Jack snaps off a perfect regulation salute.  “Sir!  Yes sir!  Right away, sir!”  He grasps the hem of his black t-shirt, pulls it over his head in one quick motion, and throws it aside.  He unlaces his boots and kicks them off.  Socks, jeans, and briefs join the t-shirt in an untidy heap on the floor.  Last of all, he unbuckles the wristband of his vortex manipulator and sets it carefully on a mahogany tea table.  
  
He’s got several favourite positions.  Which one would be best?  Jack stretches out on the chaise and rolls onto his left side, propping himself on his elbow.  He draws up his right leg, sole of his foot flat against the seat of the chaise, and bends his left knee, hooking his foot behind his right heel.  Good.  Stable, comfortable, and offering an excellent view.  
  
He turns his head to look at his audience of one.  The Doctor has pulled his chair closer, though he’s still safely out of reach.  He's leaning forward, chin propped in one cupped hand.  His gaze—dark, intense, and hungry—sweeps along Jack’s body.  Jack’s cock, already stiff and heavy against his inner thigh, springs up in a jaunty salute of its own.  
  
He resists the urge to grab his cock and start pumping away.  He can manage  _some_ self control; it’s been centuries since he was a randy teen.  He looks again at the Doctor—and freezes.  
  
The Doctor’s eyes, so outwardly human in appearance, are fixed on him with an intensity and focus that no human could ever match.  Ancient.  Unfathomable.  Alien.  Jack’s breath catches in his throat.  He can remember—he can  _see_ —another pair of dark brown eyes studying him, fascination mixed with disdain and cool amusement.  Jack wants to scream,  _needs_ to scream, but he bites down on his lower lip until it bleeds because he knows that if he opens his mouth he will beg for death to end the pain that sears his veins like acid, and he _will not_ give the bastard that satisfaction.  
  
“Jack?  Jack?”  The soft voice saying his name has the flattened vowels of Estuary English, not a smug Home Counties accent dripping with contempt for the lesser species of the universe.  
  
Jack blinks.  “Doctor?”  
  
“You all right?”  The Doctor is still leaning forward, but his hands grip the chair arms so tightly that his fingernails will probably leave scars in the leather.  His forehead is creased and his eyes— _oh gods, his eyes!_  Alien eyes, yes, old and knowing, but not cold or distant.  Jack has seen those eyes reflect a thousand moods.  Now they show only concern.  
  
“I’m fine,” Jack assures him.  It’s mostly true.  
  
The Doctor nods.  “So, you wanted a shower?” he asks diffidently.  
  
Jack considers the question—the real question.  Sex was the one potential weapon that the Master never used against him on the  _Valiant_.  The ‘animalistic rutting of mindless primitives’ held no interest for him.   _ The bastard is dead.  Dead and burnt to ashes.  I won’t give him a victory now._  He aims his best seductive smile at the Doctor.  “I’ll shower later.”  
  
A twitch of the lips is the Doctor’s only reply, but it’s enough.  
  
Jack settles back into position.  The silk upholstery is smooth and cool against his skin.  Glancing down, he’s not surprised to discover that his cock has gone limp.  He drops his right hand between his thighs and unerringly finds the sweet spot just below his balls.  He strokes it lightly, fingertips barely flickering the skin. “Like butterfly kisses,” a long-ago lover once told him.  A shiver of pleasure ripples through him, and his cock twitches in response.  His hand slowly moves upwards, fingers brushing against the soft fuzz of his sac.  
  
The Time Lord has released his death-grip on the chair.  There’s a different sort of tension in him now.  His eyes have gone dark, and he’s breathing faster.  
  
Jack cups his balls, squeezing gently.  “Can you smell me?” he asks.  “Can you smell how aroused I am?”    
  
The Doctor nods once, jerkily.  Jack knows the answer.  He can smell himself: the musky spice of his pheromones and the sour tang of sweat blending with faint traces of smoke.  The Doctor, with his keener senses, can certainly detect all that and more.  
  
“I wish you could touch me, too,” Jack continues.  He loosely curves his hand around his cock and strokes upwards, feeling the familiar shiver go through him. His index finger swirls across the slick, glistening head of his cock, and comes away beaded with moisture.  Without breaking eye contact, Jack raises the finger to his mouth and licks it clean of the salty fluid.  “And taste me.”    
  
The Doctor leans forward, inhaling deeply.  The tip of his tongue flicks across his upper lip.  
  
As Jack’s hand descends back toward his cock, he pauses to pinch first one nipple, then the other.  He closes his eyes for an instant, pretending that it’s the Doctor’s thumb and forefinger squeezing the sensitive nubs.  He’s one of the few lovers Jack has known who gets it just right: on the border of pleasure and pain, but not beyond.  Estelle—sweet girl—was always too gentle.  Angelo had been too rough, but Jack hadn’t had the heart to criticise his eager, novice efforts.  John Hart always went past rough to painful, but in his case it was deliberate.  
  
Jack rubs his right hand over the head of his cock until the palm is moist and slick.  He wraps his fingers around the shaft and begins to pump, hand sliding up and down in an easy rhythm as familiar as his heartbeat.  His eyes remain shut while his right hand continues its steady motion.  He’s fully hard now, and in the words of old Flynn, the blind fiddler of Five Points, he doesn't need to see his instrument to coax a merry tune from it.  He can make this as quick or as leisurely as he wishes.  He knows every square centimetre of skin, every sensitive spot and pressure point.    
  
“Jack, open your eyes.  I want to see you.”  
  
Jack ponders the Doctor’s wording.  Not _ “I want to see your eyes”_ but _ “I want to see  you __.”_   As if his self is located there.    
  
Maybe that’s how a Time Lord perceives identity.  What does ‘self’ mean to a telepath who changes his body, but can’t control the result as a shape-shifter can?  How would  _he_ feel if some day he woke from death to find himself in another body?  Not just one with different features, but different abilities.  More strength, say, but less agility.  Different centre of balance.  Different tastes, different desires.  Would it be intriguing, learning to coax pleasure out of a new body?  Or frustrating as all hell?  
  
“Look at me.  I want to see you,” the Doctor repeats.  
  
Jack looks into the Doctor’s eyes.  They’re a deep brown, like the bark of some ancient, towering tree, and flecked with green or gold in different lights.  Sometimes Jack misses those other eyes that could change from summer sky to glacial shadows and back again in an instant.  Still, he reminds himself, he never saw those eyes look at him this way, pupils wide with unrestrained desire.  
  
He shifts the angle of his wrist and grips his cock tighter, then begins to pump faster.  His gaze drops down for a moment, then returns to the Doctor’s face.  For the briefest of instants his rhythm falters and his breath catches in his throat.  
  
Jack is accustomed to being noticed, flattered, desired, but the absoluteness of a Time Lord’s attention is like nothing he has ever experienced before. The Doctor is watching him as if he’s trying to memorise every movement, every panting breath.   For this instant, for this tiny sliver of time, he is the most fascinating thing in the universe—the  _only_ thing in the universe.  And then the Doctor breaks into a smile that seems to spread across his entire face and down to his toes.  
  
Jack regains his rhythm.  Sometimes the Doctor’s feelings are as transparent as a child’s.  Sometimes they’re as impossible to read as the Gallifreyan glyphs that flicker across the TARDIS’s monitors.  Right now, delight blazes as bright and unmistakable as Arcturus on a July night.   
  
The Doctor’s gaze is focused mostly on his face.    Every few seconds it flickers down to Jack’s stiff cock and his busy right hand, or the red flush spreading across his chest, but it always returns to his face.  
  
The Time Lord murmurs something mellifluous that the TARDIS doesn’t translate.  Jack is surprised; the Time Lord rarely speaks Gallifreyan in front of him.  He’s too distracted to decide what it signifies.  The need and the tension are building in him.  He can’t think now, can’t stop, can’t do anything but let desire and pleasure sweep him away.  He’s not sure what’s better: that moment of anticipation just before he goes over the edge, or the long, sweet helplessness of the fall.  
  
At the moment of release he arches his back, letting out a soft moan.  The Doctor sighs and gives him another smile, tender as a caress.  “Oooh...  That was... memorable.  Thank you, Jack.  Thank you for that.”  
  
Jack returns the smile.  “Any time.”  He stretches, catlike, then lets himself go limp.  Sometimes he thinks the afterglow is the best part of sex.  
  
“Feeling more relaxed now?”  
  
“Oh, yeah.  More than you, I’d guess,” Jack replies, looking at the taut fabric of the Doctor’s trousers.  “Sorry I can’t give you a hand.”  
  
The Doctor snorts.  “What do you think I am?  Some seventy- or eighty-year-old adolescent who can’t regulate his hormones properly?  A few minutes of meditation will do the trick.”  
  
“Why not take care of it the fun way?”  
  
The Doctor’s blank look says it never occurred to him.  Maybe proper Time Lords don’t bring themselves off.  Then again, proper Time Lords don’t have sex with humans, and Jack knows very well he’s not the Doctor’s first.  
  
“Welllllllll...”  
  
“Take your clothes off,” Jack urges.  “Get naked.”  The Doctor carries burdens that would crush Atlas.  He ought to relax more often.  A good, healthy wank is just what he needs.  “Turnabout is fair play,” Jack observes mildly.  
  
The Doctor lets out a loud, exaggerated sigh.  “Cheeky sod,” he grumbles, even as he unbuttons his suit coat.  
  
Jack allows himself a grin.  “Thanks.  I try.”  He rises, leaving the couch vacant for the Doctor, then drags a mahogany Hepplewhite chair across the room for his own use.   He turns the chair around and straddles it backwards.  
  
The Doctor undresses with swift efficiency.   In private, he’s as comfortable with nudity as Jack is.  In public, he wears his suit like a uniform.  Jack wonders if it’s a Time Lord cultural thing or the Doctor’s personal quirk.  He’s never bothered to ask.  He knows he won’t get a straight answer.  
  
The Doctor settles himself on the couch, his pale, lanky body contrasting sharply with the cobalt silk.  Jack lets his gaze linger on spots he wishes he could touch: the hollow of the throat; the constellation of freckles on the left shoulder; the slender arms, far stronger than they look; and the long, nimble fingers.  
  
The Doctor gives Jack a smile and a brisk nod.  “I hope you won’t be disappointed—never done this for an audience before. Right, then.  Showtime!”  He sets those nimble fingers to work, as focused and intent on this pleasurable task as he was while saving the Ghiloz ship.  
  
Just a metre away, the self-appointed representative of the universe leans forward in his chair and watches.   
  


\--THE END--


End file.
